Prague Slavic Congress, 1848

Introduction

The Prague Slavic Congress of 1848 (also known as the Pan-Slav Congress of 1848) took place between June 2 and June 12, 1848. It was one of the few times that voices from all Slav populations of Europe were heard in one place. The meeting was meant to be a show of resistance to the German nationalism in the Slav lands.

Pan-Slavism

“Pan-Slavism” developed over time leading up to the Congress in 1848. The development of some sort of national identity helped to unite the Slavic lands against the increasing German nationalism. The identification of these lands as Slavic does not mean that they are all the same. Within the overarching Slavic category, there are many other groups such as Poles, Hungarians, Czechs and Slovenes.

The intensity of “Slavism” varied among the different factions coming to Prague. Hungarians exhibited the greatest “cultural Pan-Slavism” due to Magyarization (Orton 6). The Slavism was less noticeable with the Czechs and Slovenes because of the already large German influence. Polish Slavism was also intense and was mostly exhibited through the literature of writers such as Jan Gawiński (Orton 6).

1848 Upheavals in Europe

1848 was a year of European-wide revolution. A general disgust with conservative domestic policies, an urge for more freedoms and greater popular participation in government, rising nationalism, social problems brought on by the Industrial Revolution, and increasing hunger caused by harvest failures in the mid-1840s all contributed to growing unrest, which the Habsburg monarchy did not escape. In February 1848, Paris, the archetype of revolution at that time, rose against its government, and within weeks many major cities in Europe did the same,.

As in much of Europe, the Revolution of 1848 in the Habsburg monarchy may be divided into the three categories of social, democratic-liberal, and national, but outside Vienna the national aspect of the revolution fairly soon overshadowed the other two. The Habsburg authorities faced diverse and growing opposition in the Bohemian capital in the 1840s, but no group initiated a revolution before news of other uprisings and the government's own weakness provided the opportunity. The nascent Czech nationalist movement, which was strongest among the petty bourgeoisie of Prague and the lesser Bohemian towns, called for liberal constitutional reforms and equal educational rights for Czech-speakers and Germans. These opposition groups became increasingly vocal in the mid-1840s, Nonetheless, the hardships of the 1840s depression, the resulting popular unrest, and the growing paralysis of the Habsburg government created a crisis situation by the end of 1847.

To advance the cause of civil and cultural rights for all Slavic peoples in the Habsburg Monarchy, the historian Frantisek Palacky and other Czech leaders began in late April to organize a Slavic congress to meet in Prague five weeks later. Bloody repression by the Habsburg military in June ended the liberal efforts in Prague to win constitutional reform. Radical Czech students viewed as a provocation the return on May 20 of the reactionary military commander Alfred Prince Windischgrätz. on Whit-Monday, June 12, during the Slavic congress, they organized an outdoor "Slavic" mass at the Horse Market, now Wenceslas Square. After the mass, students and workers soon began to fight with Windischgrätz's soldiers. After six days of street fighting, artillery bombardments, and more than a hundred casualties, Windischgrätz took control of the city under a state of siege. http://www.ohiou.edu/~Chastain/ip/prague.htm

In other parts of the monarchy, the revolution of 1848 passed quickly through a liberal-democratic to a national phase, and in no place was this more evident or more serious than in Hungary. Joseph II's effort to incorporate Hungary more fully into the monarchy,. Modern nationalism made them even more intent on preserving their cultural traditions and on continuing their political domination of the land. The revolution in Paris and then the one in Vienna in March 1848 galvanized the Hungarian diet. Under the leadership of a young lawyer and journalist named Lajos Kossuth, the Hungarian diet demanded of the sovereign sweeping reforms, including civil liberties and far greater autonomy for the Hungarian government, Under great pressure from liberal elements in Vienna, the emperor acceded to these wishes, and the Hungarian legislators immediately undertook creating a new constitution for their land. This new constitution became known as the April Laws and was really the work of Kossuth. The April Laws provided for a popularly elected lower house of deputies, freedom for the “received religions” (i.e., excluding Jews), freedom of the press, peasant emancipation, and equality before the law. As the Hungarians set up their new national government based on these principles, they encountered from some of the minority nationalities living in their land the kind of resistance they had offered the Austrians. A characteristic of the new regime was an intense pride in being Hungarian, but the population in the Hungarian portion of the Habsburg monarchy was 60 percent non-Hungarian. And in 1848 all the talk about freedom and constitutions and protection of one's language and culture had inspired many of these people as well. But Kossuth and his colleagues had no intention of weakening the Hungarian nature of their new regime; indeed, they made knowledge of Hungarian a qualification for membership in parliament and for participation in government. In other words, the new government seemed as unsympathetic to the demands and hopes of its Serbian, Croatian, Slovak, and Romanian populations as Vienna had been to the demands of the Hungarians.

Besides the Hungarians and the Italians, the Slavic peoples of the monarchy also responded to the revolutionary surge, although with less violence than the other two. In June 1848 a Pan-Slav congress met in Prague to hammer out a set of principles that all Slavic peoples could endorse. The organizer of the conference was the great Czech historian František Palacký (most of the delegates were Czech), who had not only called for the cooperation of the Habsburg Slavs but who had also endorsed the Habsburg monarchy as the most reasonable political formation to protect the peoples of central Europe. Upon being asked by the Germans to declare himself favourably disposed to their desire for national unity, he responded that he could not do so because it would weaken the Habsburg state. And in that reply he wrote his famous words: “Truly, if it were not that Austria had long existed, it would be necessary, in the interest of Europe, in the interest of humanity itself, to create it.”

Unfortunately, the Pan-Slav congress met in a highly charged atmosphere, as young inhabitants of Prague likewise had been influenced by revolutions elsewhere and had taken to the streets. In the commotion, a stray bullet killed the wife of Field Marshal Alfred, Prince zu Windischgrätz, the commander of the forces in Prague. Enraged, Windischgrätz seized the city, dispersed the congress, and established martial law throughout the province of Bohemia. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-33362/Austria

The Congress

The Congress (1848), aimed at the manifestation of power, unity and vigilance of the Slavs, endangered in their existence by the plans of unification of Germany and the nationalistic policy of the Hungarians, but the exact goal was unclear. The conference planners even quarreled over its format and the agenda (Orton 57), an indication of how difficult it would be for the Slavic factions to come together.. It was the first attempt to negotiate the future relations among neighboring Slav nations of the Habsburg monarchy; and to regulate international, rather than inter-state relationships. However, it also revealed political divisions among the Slavs and disappointed many participants.

The idea of the Congress was first conceived on April 20, 1848, by Croat Ivan Kukuljevic Sakginski and Slovak L'udovít Stúr; this inspired similar projects by Jedrzej Moraczewski of Poznan, Poland. The reason was a startling intensification of German nationalism, which is why it was supported by the Czech politicians as well. On May 1, the preparatory committee of the congress issued an address inviting delegates; officially only representatives of the Slavs living in the Habsburg monarchy were invited, although Slavs from other parts of Europe were welcomed too. Altogether 340 delegates arrived representing Croats, Czechs, Dalmatians, Moravians, Poles, Ruthenians, Serbs, Silesians, Slovaks and Slovenes, as well as 500 official guests. The Czech and Slovak section sent 237 participants.

The congress held debates in three sections: Czechs and Slovaks, Poles and Ruthenians (joined also by some Silesians, Mazurians, Wielopolaks, Lithuanians, and the Russian revolutionary and one of the founders of Anarchism Mikhail Bakunin), and South Slavs. Each section elected its officers and designated 16 representatives for the plenary committee. The section of Czechs and Slovaks was headed by Pavel Josef Šafařík, the Poles and Ruthenians by Karol Libelt, and the South Slavs by Pavao Stamatovic. Czech liberal František Palacký was the president and moving force behind the congress, aided by deputies Jerzy Lubomirski from Galicia and Stanko Vraz from Slovenia.

Issues of Individual Slavic Nations

The early sessions were marked by discontentment with the vague agenda; moreover, fragmentation along national divisions were exposed right in the beginning of the congress deliberations. Dr. Josef Fric of the Czech section argued that the “primary goal is the preservation of Austria,” (Orton 69), whereas L’udovit Stur saw it in self-preservation.” (Orton 69)

For the South Slavs, the danger of Magyarization (Hungarization) was the primary concern, which led to an inevitable conflict with the Poles. The Poles sought the regeneration of the independent Polish state within the boundaries of 1772 and expected the congress to condone their right to a sovereign country. Polish aspirations were popular with the younger Czech democrats but in conflict with the political interests of most of the Czech politicians, who advocated Austroslavism – transformation of the Habsburg monarchy into a federal state, where Slavic nations would forego full political independence in favor of cultural freedom within Austria. This idea also suited the Serbs and Croats, who were likewise under Habsburg domination and threatened by Hungarian nationalism. Czechs between 1848 and 1849, with Palacky at the head, were alarmed by the vision of a united Germany whose boundaries would include the Czech lands.

On the other hand, some Czech politicians, such as Václav Hanka, saw the best future for the Slavic people in their gathering around Russia. This earned a partial approval among the southern Slavs and Ruthenians in Galicia, but certainly not so with the Poles, who were threatened by the expansion and strengthening of the tsarist Russia, their neighbor to the east. The Poles even made attempts at mediation between Slavs and Hungarians.

The Ruthenian delegates representing the Supreme Ruthenian Council [Holovna Rus'ka Rada] in Lvov viewed the congress as an opportunity to state their grievances against the Poles and publicly present a demand to divide Galicia into eastern (Ruthenian) and western (Polish) parts. The Polish and Czech delegates were against the division, and so was Mikhail Bakunin, who stated that neither St. Petersburg nor the reactionary Austrian bureaucracy would give it a go-ahead. Finally, thanks to the efforts of Leon Sapieha, who represented the Ruthenian Assembly [Rus'kyy Sobor], representing Poles of the Ruthenian origin, a Polish-Ruthenian compromise was signed on June 7, 1848. This document stipulated that Galicia would remain undivided until appropriate decisions were taken by the local Diet, both nations would have equal rights, especially language-wise); the official language in regional offices and schools would be one spoken by the majority of inhabitants of that region; and the Uniate clergy would enjoy equal rights as the Roman Catholic Church. The last requirement was not approved by the Ruthenian Supreme Council or by the Polish National Council in Lvov.

Objectives

On June 5, Karol Libelt proposed a new agenda of three objectives:

1. To issue a manifesto to all European nations stating the political orientation of the congress
2. To send a petition containing the demands of the Slavs to the Emperor
3. To draw up plans of promotion of cooperation and unity among Slavs

The "Manifesto to the European peoples" was a Polish accomplishment led by Karol Libelt and Jedrzej Moraczewski, who prepared a politically and socially radical counter-proposal to the adulatory address to the Austrian emperor proposed by the Czechs. worked out by Libelt and Palacky, assisted by Moraczewski, Lucjan Siemienski, Bakunin and Frantisek Zach, it became the basis of the final version of the "Manifest". Although many radical fragments were removed under the pressure of moderate Czech delegates, the "Manifesto" was important for its emphasis on the superiority of national rights over international treaties. The delegates even pledged readiness to acknowledge and support equal rights of all nations, regardless of their political power", and called on all Slavonic nations to organize a general congress of European peoples so that they could "regulate their international relationships on a one-to-one equal basis... before the reactionary politics of some cabinets succeeded in stirring again hate and jealousy of one nation against the other."

The Manifesto sought transformation of the monarchy into a federation of equal nations. Under the Polish influence, the initially strong anti-German tendencies were accommodated, and the right of German-speaking population outside Germany to cooperate with the inhabitants of Germany was acknowledged.

the Slavs did not look for any type of revenge (Orton 88). Rather they wanted to “extend a brotherly hand to all neighbouring nations who are prepared to recognize and effectively champion with us the full equality of all nations, irrespective of their political power or size.” (Orton 88). This indicated some sort of unity among all of the Slav people of Europe (Polišenský 147).

On June 12, the draft of the manifesto was approved, with the final session scheduled for June 14. Street fighting broke out shortly after noon, and the weeklong scuffles that followed disrupted the congress. Most of the delegates left Prague; some were arrested and expelled. This later became known as the Whitsuntide events because of the timing during the Christian holiday of Pentecost.

From July 1848, political events were increasingly unfavorable to the liberation aspirations of suppressed Slavs, and so the "Manifesto" did not change the course of political events. Still, it charted a new concept of regulating international relations in Europe, influenced by the French Revolution.

Jolanta Pekacz http://www.ohiou.edu/~chastain/ac/congslav.htm

Who’s who in the Prague Congress of 1848?

The four most important individuals of the Congress were František Palacký as the president, Karol Libelt as the chairman of the Poles and Ukrainians, Pavo Stamatović as the chairman of the South Slavs, and Pavel Šafárik as the chairman of the Czecho-Slovaks.

Frantisek Palacky (1798 – 1876), a prominent personality in the Czech National Revival of the 19th century, is considered the Father of the Czech Nation. He was born in 1798 into the family of a teacher from a Protestant minority in Moravia, which was predominantly Catholic. He felt strongly connected to the Czech nation and wrote poetry, but when he realized that he was not very good at it, he switched to a historian to aid the process of Czech National Revival, a movement aimed to revive the Czech language, culture and history, even though he had little background in this field.

The nobles in the Czech Lands approached Palacky with the post of historian of the Bohemian estates, which he held until his death in 1876. This was an important counter-measure embraced by the nobles in the Empire to the centralization efforts by the Austrian Habsburg Empire in 1820s. The nobles appointed their own historians to further their national interests. This plunged him into the mainstream of the Czech National Revival, but as the only Protestant surrounded by Catholics, he was mistrusted to an extent. Also, he was not a nobleman, yet he moved in aristocratic circles. With his wife they held a salon for patriots and national revivalists, and soon he became one of the organizers of the Prague cultural life. He headed the efforts to create the Czech encyclopedia and the National Theater in 1868.

Politically he was conservative, against Bohemia’s secession from the Austrian Empire and its unification with the German Empire. He realized that being part of the Austrian Empire had its pros too, not only the cons, which is why he advocated Austroslavism – the autonomy of Slavic nationalities within the Habsburg Monarchy and the transformation of Austria into a federal state with equal political and national rights. This was affirmed in the Manifesto at the Slavic Congress in 1848. He said, "...if it had not been for the Austrian state since long ago, we would have to… help create it as soon as possible.”

In 1832 he started working on his lifelong work History of the Czech Nation (Dějiny národu českého). Definitivní verzi dokončil v roce své smrti, 1876. Dějiny zahrnují dobu od počátků až do nástupu Habsburků 1526. Nešlo mu jen o objektivní skutečnost historických událostí, ale o národně povzbudivý záměr. Proto byly napsány jazykem přístupným široké veřejnosti. He insisted on the importance on maintaining a high moral level as a nation. His work proved that “whenever we were winning, it was always due to the prevalence of spirit rather than physical power, and whenever we were succumbing, it was always the lack of spiritual activity, moral brevity and courage that was at fault." Ač nepříliš vzdělaný, byl velmi bystrý a snažil se být dobrým vychovatelem mládeže.

Po porážce revoluce a nástupu císaře Františka Josefa I. odešel Palacký do ústraní, ale v letech 1861 - 72 se opět stal poslancem českého sněmu a na krátkou dobu i poslancem panské sněmovny říšské rady. In 1860, when the political situation relaxed once more, Frantisek Palacky was offered a seat in the Upper House of Parliament in Vienna, and a title. He refused both, and preferred to remain in Prague, where his position was more of a spiritual one than a political one. Palackého odpověď na neochotu Rakouska zajistit národům v monarchii rovnoprávnost opět vyjadřuje jeho citát: Byli jsme před Rakouskem, budeme i po něm". Ke konci života svou původní myšlenku habsburského mocnářství opustil a byl přívržencem pasivního odporu vůči říšské radě i zemskému sněmu. he was constantly monitored by the Austrian secret police. He thus devoted to research. Vděčnost a úcta národa k jeho zásluhám se projevila přízviskem Palackého Otec národa či Otec vlasti, které mu bylo dáno ještě za jeho života. Jeho pohřeb byl významnější než pohřeb královský, národ ho chápal jako svého vůdce a cítil k němu velkou úctu.

http://www.pis.cz/cz/dalsi_informace/info_a_z/palacky_frantisek/searchresult=palacky#searchres http://www.radio.cz/en/article/36682

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Sources:
Orton, Lawrence D., The Prague Slav Congress of 1848. New York: Columbia University Press, 1978.

Polišenský, Josef, Aristocrats and the Crowd in the Revolutionary Year 1848. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1980.

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